Why?

Why have you written these books?

For years, the REAP Team has been presenting some pretty good retreats; lots of teens have told us, on anonymous evaluation forms and via email, that they have experience God on our retreats. And, yet, I have always felt that our retreats are just a beginning - an introduction to Jesus and to a spiritual life. We never have time, even on our longer retreats, to share with teens all of the tools that are available to keep them strong in faith. This book project offers those tools. It is a handbook for any teen who wants to stay strong in their faith during what can be very difficult and turbulent years.

What qualifies you to write books like this?

It has been said that God does not call the qualified, but rather God qualifies the called. I don’t necessarily consider myself qualified to write this book, but I have felt called to write it. I am fully aware that I am far from perfect, but I am honestly striving to be the man that God created me to be. Many excellent Christians have encouraged and inspired me in my journey of faith, and I have learned a lot from them. Very little that you will find in this book is original; rather, it is what I consider the best advice I have received from God and others – the things that have been most helpful to me – in keeping my faith alive. And I have been privileged to work with tens of thousands of teens in my youth ministry career. Many of them have been brutally honest with me about their lives, their struggles, their joys, and their hopes. I hope that what this book project contains will be helpful to the teens I love. I believe that C.S. Lewis put it best, in the quote from him I use in the Introduction to Stirring It Up –

Think of me as a fellow-patient in the same hospital who, having been admitted a little earlier, could give some advice.